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I hate going to the doctor.
So much.
I hate sitting on the crinkly paper and waiting. Endless, miserable waiting.
"My headaches are worse," I tell Dr. Clearwater when she finally gets around to my room. "The meds just aren't working. They've never worked."
She frowns. I've only been seeing her for a year, since my last physician unexpectedly passed away. I had seen Dr. Marks regularly since I was twelve.
"I have a proposal," she says. "It might seem crazy, but hear me out."
I wait for her to go on.
"What if we start from scratch? You go off of everything and we experiment with what works and what doesn't. You've been medicated almost your whole life, Bella. Thirteen year old you was a different person than who you are now. Not just, you know, mentally but physically as well."
She's met with silence and then my soft, "no meds? At all?"
"Just for a few weeks, to get them out of your system. But I want to call me and check in every day. If you're feeling at all suicidal-go straight to the hospital. But this could be the first step in the right direction, Bella. There's a light at the end of the tunnel."
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Going off of the antidepressants is the hardest. I'm nauseous and tired and cry at everything. I can feel my teeth practically vibrating as I walk without the anti-anxiety pills.
But things are clearer. Actually, literally clearer. It's like I've been in a fog my whole life and now it's starting to lift. Things feel differently, more real.
I grow to realize that maybe the meds were giving me that empty, numb feeling. Despite the physical side effects, I feel like I can breathe again.
"You seem different," Edward Cullen says to me at lunch. He's at my table again, eating a turkey sandwich and watching me far too closely.
People keep stopping by, trying to talk to him, but he just smiles and waves them off.
He only talks to me.
"I feel different," I tell him. There's a glow about me-color in my cheeks for once and a sheen to my hair.
He looks at me, skepticism warring with something warm in his eyes.
"You know what I realized?" I say, changing the subject. "I don't know anything about you."
"You know plenty about me," he replies. "My entire life is in print and online."
"That's not what I mean. None of that's real."
His eyes bulge. "I can assure you that it is."
"I mean, sure you run this company and blah, blah, blah but it's not...the only part of you."
"Maybe it's the best part of me. The biggest part of me. "
"Bullshit."
He frowns and looks away.
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Edward Cullen is 29 years old.
His money is inherited, as is his company, having taken over for his father, who was killed in a car accident, along with Mrs. Cullen, right before his high school graduation. Run by the Board of Trustees while he was away at Harvard, he was officially named CEO two days after his 22nd birthday.
He's known for his philanthropy and his penchant for fast cars.
He is seen with a beautiful, statuesque blonde woman at many of the events he attends. Her name is Rosalie Hale and they've been best friends their entire lives, having run in the same social circles since they were in diapers. I've seen her occasionally at lunch-she works on a higher floor with the other lawyers.
Though rumors constantly circulate regarding their relationship status, they are unwavering in their insistence that they have not and will not ever be an item.
There are so many pictures of him, so many snapshots of him in suits and tuxedos and casually elegant jeans and other than Rosalie Hale, he is always alone. Surrounded by people, but never with anyone. There's something about the emptiness in his eyes, even when he's smiling, that calls to me.
I see myself there.
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